Travel Nursing in Texas in the ICU

Specialties Travel

Published

What are conditions like for RN travelers in Texas that are in the ICU?

Compensation?

Work conditions?

What area of Texas?

Can you compare Texas to other states?

I am am currently in the ICU in Houston as core staff.

Specializes in Critical Care.
Sad part is we had no lifts. Administration admitted to the employee health nurse we were not equipped to handle such patients. Did they send these people out, nope. Last guy we hand was 740lbs intubated and couldn't move, ridiculous. I ended up helping the unit out and they got us a turn system for him. No more Texas size adults for me EVER!

Well I work at a Texas hospital. A major university hospital that has been recently updated. State of the art ceiling lifts in every room of both varieties (8 point & 4 point). I mean I've never seen a facility like this and I did clinical rotations all over the Texas Medical Center in Houston.

I am pretty spoiled at my facility with so many luxuries and such a pro nurse culture that traveling sometimes scares me because I'm not used to hostile environments where nurses have no say and no equipment or support.

Up Vote Up Vote ×
Specializes in ICU, Postpartum, Onc, PACU.

It's a choice thing...I've been there so I can talk haha (thankfully not close to 600 lbs, but a hefty 300).

Nope I never have to the first question.

I'm not sure, good question. Could be a diet/regional lifestyle thing.

Up Vote Up Vote ×
Specializes in ICU, Postpartum, Onc, PACU.
Have you ever been required to ambulate (perhaps with a PT or PTA) that weighed more than 400?

Also, why so many patients of this weight? I do understand that they must have some serious comorbitities so my question is not so much why hospitalization as why this population is concentrated in your catchment area? Without Googling demographics, I'd bet there cannot be more than a dozen Americans that weigh 600 pounds or more. Mind boggling possibilities though!

I'm trying not to laugh because I think you're genuinely serious about that second to last sentence!:D I would wish that there were only a dozen people over 600lbs in the US, but that's not our reality. People don't want to change their habits and (barring the minute few who are obese simply because of chemical reasons like low thyroid, etc) everybody pays for it. Literally. I've been in a few hospitals with the lifts and mostly they can tolerate 550lbs, but some can withstand 700-750. Sadly, when they don't, it's on us and other staff to deal with the weight, trying to make sure they don't get sores, seeing to adequate nutrition without people bringing them food, etc. I've always heard stories like that from Texas and, while it wasn't somewhere I'd want to stay long enough to work, the stories are varied enough and from as many different sources to make me stay clear unless I'm on vacation.

xo

Up Vote Up Vote ×

The heaviest patient I've ever cared for was…wait for it, 1,063 lbs! Yes, and no typo there. Morbidly obese Samoan man in his late 40's, acute renal failure, liver failure, he died in there, and he had a ton of extra fluid weighing him down. It took about 8 staff members to do anything with him (boost, turn, clean pannus, ect.).

Up Vote Up Vote ×

Yuck! You guys made me Google weight demographics and I saw way too many gross pictures and never got a good answer. An answer site said a million Americans weigh over 500 pounds without a citation. I find that number difficult to believe.

Up Vote Up Vote ×

I felt like the Nurse/MD relationship was about 25 years in the past when I worked in Texas.

I actually had a critical care pulmonologist blow up on me because I didn't obtain consent forms filled out and signed by a vented patients family for a procedure. He showed up randomly expecting me to have explained the procedure, got the consents and set up the bronchoscopy cart and be prepared to assist him for the procedure. All of this with out even an order placed in the chart to do a Bronch!

There was another MD who would walk up to the station, bark which nurse had X patient then he would summon you with two fingers to signal you were to follow him to the patients room. When you'd get there he wouldn't address you or ask you anything, he just wanted you there in case he needed something while he was in the room.

Other MD's did the typical thing where they expected you to give up your chair or workstation. The nurses would make a point of making coffee for the MD's and doting on them like it was 1972.

I was expected to write orders for the MDs or act as their scribe very often. They knew I was from out of state because I refused to do this and would constantly be saying "Joint commission standard is ...." and "In non third world countries usually hospitals don't....."

I really enjoyed Texas as a state but not to practice as a nurse.

I thought maybe it would be different as advanced practice but I was wrong. A cardiologist was doing a TEE on my patient one day and he requested his personal team of nurses from his special procedure dept to come up and just be there for him. Not to mention this is the ICU where the ICU nurse is the assistant for procedures, so I had to be there as well. Not to mention the ultrasound technician who operated the machine because he didn't want to do it. To top it off he wanted a CRNA to come up and push the 50mcg of Fentanyl and 2mg Versed even though ICU nurse are totally capable to do conscious sedation and we push much more than that all day. The CRNA was insulted and pissed and the cardiologist demanded his presence and then ignored him pretty much.

I hoped it was just my hospital but many other travel nurses have made this same observation in Texas.

Up Vote Up Vote ×
Specializes in ICU.
I felt like the Nurse/MD relationship was about 25 years in the past when I worked in Texas.

I hoped it was just my hospital but many other travel nurses have made this same observation in Texas.

Nursing in what is generally considered the south, stinks. I am done in the south. I may do Virginia but, forget the rest.

Up Vote Up Vote ×
Specializes in Pediatrics.

I've been a PICU Nurse for over 2 years in Houston/Galveston - can't really complain about the relationships between medical staffing. The only jack*** that everyone despises is a fellow from Scotland. It's a teaching hospital and he sure has hell lets you know who the teacher is. I think he's just frightened by the Chief who would crush him quicker than he could bark orders at us. I'm from Jersey, so I have an objective POV. It's been pleasant, but reading these posts excites me for travel in other states!!

Up Vote Up Vote ×

I am moving to houston to work at MH, may I ask what hospital you work for?

Up Vote Up Vote ×
+ Add a Comment